Picking the next official state [fill in the blank]

Friday

Apr 7, 2017 at 2:01 PMApr 7, 2017 at 2:18 PM

When they're not creating budgets and setting policy, state lawmakers occasionally make time to focus on issues that are a bit less pressing, such as whether Massachusetts should have an official shellfish.

Gerry Tuoti Wicked Local Newsbank Editor

When they’re not creating budgets and setting policy, state lawmakers occasionally make time to focus on issues that are a bit less pressing, such as whether Massachusetts should have an official shellfish.

Massachusetts has 57 official symbols, everything from an official state cat (the tabby cat) to an official state dessert (Boston cream pie), and bills proposing additional state symbols are introduced nearly every legislative session.

Lawmakers often file the bills on behalf of students in their districts, providing a hands-on civics lesson. Like any other bill, the proposals must pass the House and Senate on majority votes before heading to the governor and becoming law. Oftentimes, they never make it to the chamber floor for a vote.

Massachusetts already has an official rock and an official song, but a new bill from state Rep. David Linsky, D-Natick, would make the song “Roadrunner” by Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers the state’s official rock song.

A bill from state Sen. Marc Pacheco, D-Taunton, would designate the quahog as the official shellfish of the commonwealth, while legislation from state Rep. Thomas Calter, D-Kingston, would give that honor to the oyster. Could there be a shellfish showdown?

Pacheco’s quahog bill, first proposed in 2005 on behalf of a 7th-grade social studies class in Taunton, has been filed every session since but has never come up for a vote. The students argued the quahog’s use as an early trade currency between American Indians and British settlers demonstrates its importance in Massachusetts history.

“I have continued to try to get it done because they backed up their ideas with real research,” Pacheco said. “It’s always a challenge. There’s usually a competing bill, and obviously there are a lot of other things we’re dealing with at the Statehouse that require a significant amount of time. But it’s always a good teaching tool about how a bill becomes a law.”

Calter filed his bill on behalf of a Kingston oyster farmer. Picking the oyster as the official state shellfish, an aide said, would recognize the increasingly important place oyster farming has in the Massachusetts agricultural industry.

· County song: “14 Counties of Massachusetts” by Alissa Coates and Darci Hamann, as recorded by third- and fourth-grade students at Our Lady’s Academy in Waltham (presented by state Rep. Thomas Stanley, D-Waltham)